


TO SERVE

by Anne_Fairchild



Category: Upstairs Downstairs (2011)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Historical death of real life character, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 22:09:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15694323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anne_Fairchild/pseuds/Anne_Fairchild
Summary: George, the Duke of Kent, and Hallam Holland have a unique friendship. In the dark days of the war, with things not going well for the Allies, George needs that friendship and all that it entails.





	TO SERVE

“Sir - the Duke of Kent, sir,” Pritchard announced softly. Holland’s heart contracted with happiness and relief as the door opened.

It had all been going to hell in a hand basket - the thrust and parry of the war negotiations - for Holland thought of the wretched sham diplomacy as such - his affair with Persie, his marriage, and even his relationship with the Duke.

Their estrangement over increasing ideological differences had saddened him greatly, but he couldn’t reach out. It wouldn’t do, especially after the discovery of what Persie had been doing. He had no wish to taint his friend. Still, he’d hoped that perhaps, at some point before too much time had passed for reconciliation, George might approach him - and now he had.

The debonair figure appeared a bit sheepish at his entry, uncertain of his welcome.

“Dear boy, I hope I’m not intruding at this late hour,” he ventured tentatively.

“Not at all, sir. I’m always glad to see you,” Holland responded. “Very glad indeed,” he added with a genuine smile. There was no need for apologies from either to the other. That George was here said more than words that he valued his frienship with Holland. Words would only get in the way.

“Gracious as always, Hal. May I?” The Duke slipped off his dinner jacket and lowered himself to a sofa. He fiddled a bit nervously in plucking a cigarette from his case, so Holland was quick to light it for him.

“Can I get you anything?” Holland asked, indicating the bar.

“Yes, dear chum.” Again Holland noticed his apparent nerves.

“Is everything all right, sir?” The Duke met his eye, but then looked away.  
  
“I have come to seek solace with you if you don’t mind, old friend. But not exclusively of the alcoholic and conversational variety.”

Ah. There it was, then. Something he could and would do for this complicated man he loved. Something he had done for his friend since their school days, though he hadn’t been asked since the dark days after the abdication.

“I am at your service, Sir.” It would sound horribly stiff and forced to an observer, but the Duke took it exactly as he knew Holland meant it, a bit of a blind for the love and tenderness behind it.

“Thank you, my friend.” The Duke looked tired, bluish hollows beneath his large dark eyes.

“Let me just inform Pritchard, and we can go upstairs,” Holland told him. It would be arranged so the staff would avoid the Duke’s guest suite until and unless he rang or until they received instruction from the master of the house. Arranged so that they would be left quite alone.

“Shall I have Pritchard inform your driver?”

“I - already told him he needn’t wait tonight. I can telephone tomorrow morning.” The admission came quietly. “I had no right to be that certain of you, but I hoped -“

“And I’m glad you were,” Holland assured him. “It will be all right.”

“I wonder if anything will ever be all right again,” the Duke sighed as Holland handed him a drink.

“It will, sir, even if only for a few hours.” Holland let his hand drop to briefly caress the sleek head before going to the drawing room door to speak with Pritchard.

When he returned, he resisted the urge to touch the Duke in comfort again except lightly on the shoulder. The first drink was gone and the Duke downed another with some haste before he looked up, grasped his friend’s hand, and rose.

“May we?”

“Sir.” Holland smiled warmly. He held the Duke’s hand until they reached the door, squeezed gently, then let go. For a moment before he opened the door, he rested a warm palm between George’s shoulders when those shoulders hunched briefly - in weariness, fear, or - ? They climbed the stairs with measured treads, speaking of inconsequential nothings until Holland left him outside the door of the suite.

“Good night, Sir. Sleep well.”

“I shall endeavour to do so, Holland. Good night, and thank you for your hospitality.” Their public parts were easily played; the Duke, at least, had spent a lifetime perfecting his.

In his own room, Hallam shed his clothes and donned pyjama bottoms and a dressing gown. As he’d done many times before over the years, he threw back the bedclothes, punched his pillow a few times, and lay in the bed tossing and turning for a minute or two; it would do for now. He left his nearly empty whisky glass beside the bed. There were glasses, whisky, and soda in the suite. His fingertips already pricked with the familiar nervish tingle he experienced when he and George were alone together for this purpose.

Hallam silently opened his bedroom door, stepped outside, and closed it behind him soundlessly. He padded across the hall, gave two short knocks, and stepped in.

The Duke had removed his shoes, but that was all. He was sipping a whisky soda and had made one for Hallam. At the sight of him, bone-weary, stressed and needy in a way possibly only he ever saw, Hallam was gripped with love for George. He knew that the Duke took his pleasure with whomever he liked of either sex, as well as his wife. He was attracted to sex like a moth to flame, and at one time to drugs as well. People could say what they liked about his brother, Edward the former King, but it had been his adored David who’d gotten George off the drugs. It was a time he hadn’t seen much of the Duke, by sad choice. He hadn’t wanted Agnes to know, though he was certain his mother would have known.

His mother, ever the pragmatist, would have understood his relationship with George, though she would not have comprehended the depth of the affection that grounded it. Still, he had taken particular care that she had not known of it - for the simple reason that he hadn’t wanted anything or anyone to be in a position to stop it.

Hallam had never felt a desire for other men, only for George and only when George needed him. It was the needing, and the closeness between them, that served to arouse him. The world could, and did, say what it liked about the Duke of Kent, but to each other they were simply Hal and George, two very close, long-time friends.

The Duke’s smile was tired. “Make it all go away except you, and me. Help me to cope with the bloody mess this world has turned into!”

Hallam sat on the bed, pulling George into his arms. “Shhhhh,” he soothed, holding him close. George leaned hard into the embrace. Hallam could feel a fine trembling in the body beneath his hands. All of the current generation of Windsor men were highly strung, nervy like the thoroughbreds they loved to raise.

“It’s all right now,” he murmured, pressing kisses to the glistening pomaded hair, inhaling the expensive scent of his carefully groomed and tended friend and sometime lover.

“Hal.” It was breathed softly against his collarbone, a hand reaching up to grip his shoulder. Feelings long dormant flooded back into Hallam at this. Something began to stir inside him.

He tipped George’s head up and kissed him. He smelled of whisky and cigarettes and expensive talc. The kiss was deep and slow, meant to be a caress in itself. Softly planting kisses everywhere he could reach, Hallam felt some of the tension leave the Duke. Soft sighs of capitulation fell warmly against his neck.

Carefully, he began working at shirt studs, one at a time, setting each one in a small wooden box on the night table. He loosened the starched shirt front, then the tie and the stiffened collar came off, and the cummerbund. With each item removed, the Duke relaxed by inches, becoming heavier against Hallam’s shoulder.

It was usually like this. Hallam never rushed, and George never really wanted him to. What had developed between them over the years was as much about the caring and the minding as it was about the sex; perhaps more. The tenderness George had never experienced as a child, he could not now accept from anyone but Hallam. Sometimes the responsibility frightened Hallam a little, but he never let George see that. He understood on one level that it was a duty and a service he performed, but he loved and cared for George so much he rarely considered that; it was irrelevant to him.

The cream satin waistcoat came next, one tiny covered button at a time. Then the smartly striped tie. A small pile of clothing had accumulated, and Hallam lowered the Duke to the bed while he moved it all to a chair. He sat on the edge of the bed, unfastening gold cufflinks and then unbuttoning the expensive Turnbull and Asser shirt. George gazed up at him with expressive, clear brown eyes.

“I’ve missed you,” he admitted.

“And I’ve missed you, very much. I’m sorry we lost each other,” Hallam told him, making slow, soothing circles with his palm over the fine cotton vest. George closed his eyes, sighing loudly as Hallam’s pressed down more firmly over a nipple.

“You know me so well,” he murmured.

Hallam knew George’s body very well indeed, as George knew his. He could always please the body, if he couldn’t always please the man. He bent to take George’s head in his hands, and kissed him hard on the lips. George’s mouth opened, admitting Hallam’s aggressive tongue, which dueled with his before Hallam moved to capture a nipple in his teeth through the thin material of the vest. The sounds coming from deep in George’s throat were making Hallam hard now. He wondered how vocal, or how quiet, George was with other lovers. He wondered if he heard a George that no one else did; he liked to think he did, whatever the truth of it.

“It’s been a long time,” the Duke whispered raggedly, raising his arms so Hallam could pull the vest off over his head. “Do you mind?” the Duke asked.

“That it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you? Yes, I have minded that. It’s made me quite unhappy,” Hallam admitted.

“Hal.”

“No. I’ve never ‘minded’, as you put it. And certainly not now,” Hallam told him, leaning down to kiss the damp swirls covering his chest.

“Dear Hallam,” the Duke sighed, raising himself so Hallam could get his trousers off and fold them neatly across the chair that held the rest of his clothes. “I have missed you very much indeed.” Hallam shivered at that. It was perhaps the closest George could come to admitting his true feelings.

The Duke slipped his hands inside Hallam’s dressing gown. Hallam shivered again, this time at the soft coolness, reacting sharply when smooth, manicured fingertips brushed his nipples. He made a sound and pressed the Duke’s hands to his chest.

“You want me, too? It isn’t just -“

“Yes,” Hallam assured him. As it had always been, in the moment he wanted George as much as George wanted and needed him. He could never explain this, it just _was._ But George had never asked him before if he minded; had never exactly given him a choice other than the first time, so many years ago. Then, he could have put him off, saying it was inconvenient or something equally as vague, but he never had.

“Get this damned thing off then,” the Duke grumbled lightheartedly, fumbling at the pyjama ties at Hallam’s waist.

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir,” Hallam smiled, quickly wriggling out of the offending garment and sliding off the Duke’s silk boxers a moment later. He pulled the Duke into his arms, touching and kissing him a long while before he reached between them to pleasure George with his hand. He took his time, letting the stimulation build slowly. He was sure George’s usual encounters with either sex were over fairly quickly, due as much to circumstance as anything else.

The pale, chiseled face radiated pleasure, but also release of care and worry that had less to do with gratification than it did with trust. Hallam knew exactly what George liked, and gave it to him. He pressed George back on the bed and settled over him. His hands and mouth were sometimes rough and sometimes gentle. He’d heard from gossip sources that George could be fond of a bit of the rough, so he gave him that within the bounds of his own comfort level. He would never really hurt George physically, even if George wanted him to.

Hallam let his weight rest on George, rocking his hips for their mutual pleasure. George put his arms around Hallam and met his thrusts, and they moved with each other in silence, broken only by moans quickly stifled. This was borne of decades of the need for absolute secrecy, but neither man was very vocal in their lovemaking with their wives either, as a result.

And then, after several minutes, George stopped, gripping Hallam’s shoulders and looking up at him.

“Sir? Are you all right? Have I done -“

“Dearest Hal - would you…fuck me, to put it bluntly?”

The question was bold and asked with a touch of lighthearted wit, but Hallam saw the seriousness of the question in his eyes. He also realized it wasn’t a request, but a genuine question he could answer as he chose. He was surprised. Not that George would engage in a variety of sexual acts, but that George wanted _him_ to do this. He’d never before let on in all the years they’d been together.

“I - are you certain, sir?” It was all he could think to say.

“For God’s sake, who should I want and trust more than you?”

“But you have - ?”

George laughed. “Oh, _Hal!_ ”

“But you’ve never…we’ve never -“ Hallam’s puzzlement hung in the air.

“Well it wasn’t,” George told him, “because I didn’t want to. I’ve just never asked you. You’re married to darling Agnes, after all, whom I adore, and you’re not homo-secks-yule.” He drew the word out crisply. “You might not want to. So, I didn’t ask. But we haven’t seen each other in so long. And there’s that damned ‘secret council’ I must attend, in bloody Iceland of all places. I don’t know when I might see you again. But I’ll understand if you can’t.”

“I didn’t say that,” Hallam returned quickly. “I just never thought about it.”

“Put on your thinking cap, then, before we discuss it to the death of our respective members,” George suggested. His tone was light, but his eyes were serious.

Hallam closed his eyes and remembered his earlier vow to give George whatever he wanted tonight. His hesitation was not from any distaste, only from lack of knowledge, and fear that it would change things between them after they’d only just come together again. George wasn’t simply asking to be serviced, he was greatly increasing their level of intimacy and putting himself in a vulnerable position, even taking into account their friendship.

“I’ll be back shortly,” Hallam promised, getting up and going into the en suite to look for something to use as lubricant. What he and Agnes sometimes used was in their bathroom, and he couldn’t very well nip across the hall for it. Hallam knew nothing about this act between men except what went where and that some kind of lubrication was involved. He would have to trust that George knew what was what.

He found something, and brought it back to the bedside. In his absence George had been tending to himself, and now moved with a rather cheeky smile to do the same for Hallam, who closed his eyes and let himself enjoy it.

Something was different tonight. The quiet desperation, the request, and now this participation from a normally fairly passive George were all new ground. Whatever it was, Hallam didn’t want to disappoint him.

“That,” George drawled, indicating the cream on the bed, “goes here,” he indicated his back passage, “and here,” he indicated Hal’s cock. “It’s all right old man, I’ll do the honours.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t really know what to do. How to please you like this,” Hallam confessed.

“Well, the important part comes naturally,” the Duke told him cheerfully, spreading the lubricant where it needed to go. Hallam felt as if George were searching his face for any sign he didn’t really want to do this. He kept his face blank, but inside his emotions were churning. This didn’t seem to be a sudden whim on the Duke’s part, judging by his unusual behavior and demeanor tonight. It was something that George wanted to happen between them, for his own reasons. And Hallam loved him enough to do it.

“There are different ways to go about this, but I want to look at you, dear Hal. I want to see your face. So - “. The Duke sat near the end of the bed and then lay back, knees raised, gazing intently at Hallam.

“Please, Hal.” That word had never been used between them about sex before. It shook Hallam a little that George would express a personal need of any sort, let alone this.

“You’ll tell me if I hurt you? If I’m…doing it wrong?” Hallam asked nervously.

“Yes, dear boy, not to worry,” George assured him, his voice slightly strained. “Only - the night’s not getting any younger.”

Hallam slid George to the end of the bed. He grasped his member and slowly, carefully, pressed it against the entrance to George’s body. He pressed forward only a little, and was relieved that he met no strong resistance. He continued then, until he found himself fully sheathed. George groaned, but the look in his eyes spoke of pleasure.

“Proceed as usual,” he urged Hallam in his normal slightly mocking tone.

Hallam did so, cautiously at first, but his caution dropped away when it was obvious from George’s face and the sounds he was making that there was nothing wrong and that George was definitely enjoying the experience.

His passage was tight, affording a pressure that pleased Hallam as well. And there were George’s dark eyes gazing up at him, slitted in pleasure. He stroked George’s member as he stroked his passage, until he felt it stiffen and jerk in his hand and George’s seed erupted over his fist.

“Well done, old boy. Now - finish the job, eh?” As earlier, the words themselves were impossibly stuffy - and meaningless. It was the emotion in the tone and the looks exchanged that went deep and mattered. Hallam moved faster, gazing into George’s encouraging eyes. It was those sad, yearning eyes that pushed him over the edge to come, he realized a great deal later. His dearest friend asking for more than the physical act, and him wanting George to have it.

Hallam rose and made to go into the en suite for some wet flannels, part of the usual ritual.

“Hal, leave it.” Assuming George wasn’t serious but simply speaking in the lazy afterglow of completion, Hallam ignored him.

“Hallam - don’t. Come back to bed now.”

There was a slight air of command in the words, and a hint of desperation. Hallam came back to the bed as he was bidden. He pulled back and straightened the bedclothes and George moved beneath them. He then slid in himself and pulled everything up around them.

“You’re a good friend, Hal.” Hallam wasn’t sure what to say.

“So are you, even when I don’t deserve it.”

“True, old chap.” There was humour in his voice again.

Cautiously, unsure of exactly what George wanted, Hallam moved closer. When he moved his arm so that it went loosely around the Duke’s shoulder, George moved to lie against him, his head resting on Hallam’s chest, his arm resting lightly on Hallam’s stomach.

“Thank you.” No levity now.

“Sir, is there something troubling you? Something you’re able to share, if you wish?” Hallam ventured.

“Nothing solid, old man - just a feeling. A feeling I’m having trouble shaking off,” the Duke admitted. “Can’t pin it down. A sort of darkness. Wanted to be with someone I trust. Someone I…care about very much. Nothing to be ‘done’ I s’pose. But - the company helps, Hal.”

“Anything I can do, you know that I will.”

“You’re doing it now, old fellow.”

They lay in the dark, sleepless, holding onto each other. Hallam couldn’t help wonder if there was more to this that George wouldn’t say or couldn’t. Certainly, the War and all its secrets, its back-room deals and compromises, was getting to all of them. It was a dirty business in many ways.

For his part, Hallam was simply grateful that whatever the reason, he and George were good friends again. In some ways, he had missed George more than he’d missed Agnes, though he wouldn’t admit it if he were ever so accused.

George had been there for the lonely boy he’d been, just come over from India, friendless and angry at being abandoned. He had smoothed it all away and brought out the sun again. It meant a great deal to Hallam that their rift had been mended, and that George felt as close to him as he felt to George.

 

                                                                               ***

 

In the early pre-dawn, Hallam rose and performed their tidying ritual as George looked up at him with eyes that reflected uncertainty.

“I wish you were coming with me to the damned meeting. You would be, if you were my equerry, you know.” He referred to the offer he’d made Hallam months ago, after he’d resigned from his post because of the to-do about Persie’s death and all that had come before it. Hallam hadn’t thought it wise then.

“Will you allow me to think about it - get in touch with you after you’re back?”

“Of course.”

After that, Hallam put his pyjamas and dressing gown on and went across the hall to his own room, where he showered and dressed, taking his time in order to give George time for his dressing and toilette. He then went back and knocked on the door. The Duke was dressed, nibbling toast and sipping tea from a tray that had been brought.

“My driver will be here in a few minutes. Thank you, Hal, for last night. For everything. For being here when I need you. I know I must often seem ungrateful, but I’m not, truly.” The Duke seemed nervous again, on edge.

“Whatever it is, it will pass. Go to your conference, and come here to visit as soon as you’re able when you return,” Hallam urged.

“I shall. Best get the thing over with. Don’t come down with me, there’s a good chap,” the Duke told him. He gave Hallam a hug, and a quick peck on the cheek, and was out the door, leaving Hallam feeling sadly bereft.

 

  
                                                                                ***

 

  
Several days later, Hallam was surprised when Pritchard himself brought his newspaper into the breakfast room on a tray. He noted there was a telegram addressed to him laid on top of the paper. Pritchard coughed.

“If there is anything I or the staff, can do for you my lord, you have only to ask.”

“Yes, thank you, Pritchard,” he responded automatically, not catching the strain in the butler’s tone.

Finishing his coffee, he picked up the telegram, dated 7 a.m. that morning, Aug 25, 1942. He frowned as he read “Dearest Hallam, I shall be back in London by noon. If I am devastated, I can’t imagine how you are coping. We’ll see it all through together.” Distinctly odd. He and Agnes had spoken on the phone no more than once a week for the past six months, and she’d only been to town twice in all that time. Now she was rushing home, commiserating with him about - ?

An icy feeling crept over him as he unfolded the newspaper and stared at the black-bordered headline: DUKE OF KENT DIES IN CRASH FLYING TO ICELAND.

It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. It had to be a mistake. There must be survivors. He scanned the newsprint but it only brought home the totality - no known survivors, all had apparently perished when the plane, off-course, had crashed into the side of a mountain. One body still missing, but it wasn’t the Duke’s.

George gone. Forever. He would never see him again, never hear his voice, laugh at his jokes, share a drink with him. He didn’t honestly think he could bear even thinking about it.

He called for Pritchard, now wearing a black arm band, and asked him to check the train timetables and to send Spargo to pick up Agnes. Then he slowly rose from the table and walked up the stairs, ignoring whoever it was in the hallway asking something of him. He could neither hear nor see.

He went into the room where he and George had spent the night less than a week ago, and closed the door. He looked around wildly for some little item left or discarded, but there was nothing. Nothing at all left of his so-loved friend. Hallam lay down on the bed. Grief poured from him in great dry, wracking sobs of wretched loss that no one else would ever see.

Agnes found him there, hours later. He took some comfort from her presence knowing that she had loved George too; they shared that, if little else these days.

“I can’t bear to think about it - any of it. My God,” Hallam shuddered.

“We must be ready for the memorial service,” Agnes told him.

“I can’t do it,” he shook his head. “I could never maintain - no, I can’t. I can’t,” he shouted, sobbing again.

“Hallam,” Agnes began gently. “It’s not just about George. It’s about Marina and the children, and the King and Queen, and your country. And it’s about George too of course. Our last chance to show our love. Surely, you’re able to give him that, even though it will be terribly hard. But we’ll do it because we loved George, won’t we?”

After a long moment before he regained some composure, Hallam nodded. “Yes,” he whispered, “for George. To show him how much I loved him. He loved me, I know that. He made sure I knew it, after all this time. But I can’t be sure he knew that I loved him. And I did - very much.”

“Dear Hallam, he knew. He couldn’t possibly not have. You were his rock and he adored you.”

“I’m going to miss him so much.”

“I know.”

“Will you - can you leave me here for awhile?”

“Of course. Shall I send up some tea?”

“No - I want to be alone. I’ll be down in a while.”

Agnes slipped out quietly, and Hallam lay back on the bed. If he closed his eyes, perhaps he could will himself back to that night - could feel the weight of George’s head resting on him once again, imagine George looking up at him the way he had, and the look in his eyes. He could try and say goodbye here, the last place George had been truly happy, and hope that George would hear him.

_Well done, old chap. I know I can depend on you._

Yes, George.  Always.

**Author's Note:**

> Written halfway between series canon and real life history, as the Duke was a real person who did die in a plane crash on the date specified. The cause of the crash will likely never be known, although there are many wild theories. All information on it has been sealed or has vanished. The Royal Family has never spoken about his death and no memorial specific to him was ever made. There is a mystery there, hence George’s feelings of foreboding. Time was compressed somewhat in the story.


End file.
